Why French Kids Don't Have ADHD (psychologytoday.com)

[Pluvious]

Interesting differences...

In the United States, at least 9 percent of school-aged children have been diagnosed with ADHD, and are taking pharmaceutical medications. In France, the percentage of kids diagnosed and medicated for ADHD is less than .5 percent. How has the epidemic of ADHD—firmly established in the U.S.—almost completely passed over children in France?

Is ADHD a biological-neurological disorder? Surprisingly, the answer to this question depends on whether you live in France or in the U.S. In the United States, child psychiatrists consider ADHD to be a biological disorder with biological causes. The preferred treatment is also biological—psycho stimulant medications such as Ritalin and Adderall.

French child psychiatrists, on the other hand, view ADHD as a medical condition that has psycho-social and situational causes. Instead of treating children's focusing and behavioral problems with drugs, French doctors prefer to look for the underlying issue that is causing the child distress—not in the child's brain but in the child's social context. They then choose to treat the underlying social context problem with psychotherapy or family counseling. This is a very different way of seeing things from the American tendency to attribute all symptoms to a biological dysfunction such as a chemical imbalance in the child's brain.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/suffer-the-children/201203/why-french-kids-dont-have-adhd

[TexasProgresive]

1. French treat the disorder US medicate symptoms.

[SunSeeker]

16. Yep. Because it's a lot easier to medicate the kid than change the kid's environment.

Talking to a therapist takes time and lots of money. Plus, good, efffective child pschologists are hard to find, even if you have the money. Ritalin is relatively cheap. It really is a tragic state of affairs for the child.

[Achilleaze]

32. Drugs are a huge republican profit center

drug and chemical and oil and coal and las vegas casino companies keep the kgop republican bandwagon rolling (in addition to the Dark Money from russia, of course).

there's your stinking republican "values" right there

[WhiskeyGrinder]

2. French Kids DO Have ADHD (psychologytoday.com)

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/pay-attention/201511/french-kids-do-have-adhd

Three years ago, the family therapist Marilyn Wedge wrote a blog entry for Psychology Today titled "Why French Kids Don't Have ADHD."

At last count, it has gotten 1.8 million "likes."

But it was wrong.

There's no question that French kids have attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD. Kids all over the world have ADHD.

I'm not the first to question Wedge's provocative headline. In 2013, the neuropsychologist David Nowell noted that a 2011 French study estimated the French prevalence of ADHD at between 3.5 and 5.6 percent. This squares with other research that has found the global prevalence between 5.3 percent and 7.2 percent.

[Duppers]

19. I agree. 👍

ADD is a genetic trait that can be traced in my family.

A prominent Child Neurologist, along with five independent professionals (my "not-My-son" husband demanded so many diagnostic exams), diagnosed my son 23yrs ago. My son now has a PhD in theoretical physics, which would not have been possible without Ritalin. The Child Neurologist? He's now Virginia's Democratic Governor.

[applegrove]

3. Someone studied add or adhd in indigenous groups in Kenya. Those

with the disorder were the best hunters. It makes sense if you think about it....looking everywhere until you find the prey and that stimulates you to follow. And remember how important hunting was to us all back in the day. Any village with a few people with add or adhd would be lucky indeed.

[radius777]

6. exactly. alot of these disorders

were once adaptive but are now maladaptive in the modern world.

that's likely why they're so hard to treat and cure, because they're deeply embedded in the human genetic code.

[applegrove]

7. Or you find the job that uses those talents.

[uponit7771]

17. +1, had a friend who was a surver that could shoot an azimuth by sight and be within tenths ...

... and rarely had to use a calculator but hated the inside of an office.

[Phoenix61]

4. I've worked with kids for years as a therapist

There were a lot of kids on meds for ADD/ADHD that shouldn't have been. Most were either suffering from SBS (Spoiled Brat Syndrome), or chronically chaotic households that had them stressed out all the time. There is a lot of crossover between symptoms for ADHD/ADD and PTSD. The rates of ADHD/ADD for children in the foster care system is incredibly high. It always frustrated me that the level of trauma they had experienced wasn't really addressed. I'm no longer in that field but it seems to be getting better. There is a lot more awareness of the impact trauma has in children.

[RobinA]

18. I'm In That Field

More awareness? Maybe. More done about it? Not so much. I work with adults who were those kids. Most of the psychiatrists I work with have absolutely no understanding of the environments most of these people grew up in.

[Duppers]

21. I feel so sorry for those children.

They are doubly victimized.

I knew of a family who wanted their obviously gay, young son treated with meds!!

I got the opposite end of that spectrum - had a friend blaming me for my son's ADD. I recognized my young son's problems because I had experienced them. Damn genes!

[kcr]

25. Spoiled brat syndrome?

Uh huh. On the internet, no one knows you're a dog.

[Phoenix61]

30. Yep

It develops when a child doesn't hear the word "no" until they get to school and then all heck breaks loose. The child has never had to control impulses and doesn't understand why they have to now. The parent doesn't understand why they are getting daily frowny face reports because their child is a little angel at home. I always felt sorry for those kids because it wasn't their fault they hadn't been taught you don't always get what you want when you want it.

[kcr]

31. I see.

And are diabetics just people who don't know how to put down the cake? Do people with arthritis just not get out and move around enough? Move it or lose it, huh? We should have an anti-science/ anti-med forum on DU. We can combine it with a forum about the good old days where they didn't have to wear a bike helmet and their parents beat some character into them three times a day before breakfast, then all the street lamps turned off and they could roam free. Seems like there's some overlap, there.

[teach1st]

5. That blog is old and its premise is not true

As WhiskeyGrinder pointed out in Post 2.

While it may be so that ADHD is mis or over-diagnosed in the United States, and while it may be true that current medications for ADHD are over-prescribed, the premise of the blog in the OP is not true.

Here's a (dated) rebuttal:

https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/intrinsic-motivation-and-magical-unicorns/201305/course-french-kids-have-adhd

A post here at Psychology Today created real interest in the possibility that French children may be less likely to be diagnosed and treated for Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. In fact, however, the prevalence of ADHD among French children appears to be about 3.5% to 5.6% - which is consistent with the DSM-IV-TR estimate of prevalence in the US. And, just as in the US, the diagnosis was frequently co-occurring with behavioral disorders and academic underperformance, and boys were more likely than girls to receive a diagnosis of ADHD.

Likewise, a 2003 literature review found similar prevalence of ADHD in 30 non-US countries.

[gulliver]

8. Recess and better food.

France has 2 hour lunch breaks with great food. They spend part of that time eating and the rest playing. Playing is extremely important.

[appalachiablue]

13. Diet and play time is critical to children's dvmt. My sister is an

experienced Montessori teacher who's battled a couple directors trying to reduce or eliminate playtime breaks. The pro was adamant and the kids went out to recreate in the air, and free.

[tirebiter]

9. Snails and wine.

Maybe you make 2 hours sad hours.

[marlakay]

10. Just look at Michael Moore's movie that shows

what they eat in school every day. Their diet.

[Duppers]

22. Food dyes and sugar in particular

Trigger episodes. They're not good for anyone.

[CousinIT]

11. Big drug & insurance companies do not control the govt or healthcare system in France

as they do in the US. In France, treatment is probably dictated more based on what is recommended by doctors and what's best for patients, not by what is covered by insurance or what the latest hot treatment drug companies are peddling to doctors and the public at ridiculous prices (Ritalin, Viagra, etc.) So naturally our populace and our physicians are encouraged to turn to drugs first for such things.

I don't believe that's the only difference but I do believe one of them.

[appalachiablue]

12. On point. $$

[Lithos]

14. They have proven the biological link

https://www.additudemag.com/can-a-blood-test-diagnose-adhd/

The question is the best way to treat. To be honest, the best way is likely a combination with the specifics based on the child's need.

[Duppers]

23. Thank you!!

[pnwmom]

15. The title is misleading, because the article doesn't say French kids don't have ADHD.

It says the treatment is different there -- psychotherapy or family counseling.

French child psychiatrists, on the other hand, view ADHD as a medical condition that has psycho-social and situational causes. Instead of treating children's focusing and behavioral problems with drugs, French doctors prefer to look for the underlying issue that is causing the child distress—not in the child's brain but in the child's social context. They then choose to treat the underlying social context problem with psychotherapy or family counseling.

There are some other points in the article that make little sense to me. The article claims that French parents believe in structure, and so they make sure their babies sleep through the night by 4 months. Most American parents also share that goal, for reasons of self-preservation if nothing else -- except possibly for breastfeeding mothers. Somehow I doubt that breastfeeding is a cause of ADHD.

And it says that French parents think some "judicious" spanking is fine -- as if that is a contrast to parents in the U.S. It is not -- unfortunately, in my view.

[DonCoquixote]

20. French culture may soothe some problems

But the danger articles like this do is to make people believe that someone's brain chemistry is "hogwash". A lot of these conditions were very useful back in the days when you needed craftsmen or people that did not need to fit into a set social pattern to be useful: technicians like Gates and Zuckerberg, comedians like Robin Williams and Dan Akroyd, all Asberger's sufferers who found a way, and found the luck, to make money. However, most people who are not "nuerotypical" often wind up being that one person who is "so mart, but never makes money." It can be too easy to read this article and think you can spank and yell a kid to being "normal."

[Spider Jerusalem]

24. France is still in thrall to the psycho-analytic model

which has had pretty catastrophic results as regards their treatment of autistic disorders, in particular: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/08/france-is-50-years-behind-the-state-scandal-of-french-autism-treatment

France is not a model to be emulated, here, or a source of good ideas.

[kcr]

26. That's an old article and was already refuted at the time

https://www.psychologytoday.com/au/blog/here-there-and-everywhere/201209/french-kids-do-have-adhd-interview

And pychologytoday is is a mixed bag to begin with. All kinds of crap there.

[yallerdawg]

27. Our experience raising children in the public school systems...

is teachers, counselors and principals looking for common normative behavior in their classrooms.

Whenever parent/teacher meetings went to "Your child is probably ADHD" we would laugh at them and tell them, "Just do your damn job." Funny thing is, no Ritalin or ADHD, and they stopped calling us for parent/teacher nights.

When we started homeschooling, our kids had excelled academically, our daughter ranked No. 2 in her grade in the entire county.

Unfortunately, our public schools ranked at worst in the state (except football) so they never did do their job. We ended up having to do it for them.

[ck4829]

28. Bigger than France, let's talk about the social construct theory of ADHD

Last edited Mon Jul 2, 2018, 01:39 PM - Edit history (2)

The social construction theory of ADHD argues that attention deficit hyperactivity disorder is not necessarily an actual pathology, but that an ADHD diagnosis is a socially constructed explanation to describe behaviors that simply do not meet prescribed social norms.

Some proponents of the social construct theory of ADHD seem to regard the disorder as genuine, though over-diagnosed in some cultures. These proponents cite as evidence that the DSM IV, favored in the United States for defining and diagnosing mental illness, arrives at levels of ADHD three to four times higher than criteria in the ICD 10, the diagnostic guide favored by the World Health Organization.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_construct_theory_of_ADHD

When one doesn't act how society wants you to act, you face sanctions... dirty looks, shunning, people calling you weird or deviant, criminal penalties, and yes, you might be diagnosed with a mental illness too.

It's not that France's approach = good, it's just that the people and institutions have different ways of sanctioning you, and kids, when norms are broken.

[kcr]

33. I think there is something to that

You're right, though ADHD is actually a neurological condition, societies that don't diagnose as much very well may not have to. That may not necessarily be a bad thing.

The problem is people in more rigid societies tend to have more rigid thinking. If a person isn't complying with those norms, it's because they're choosing not to. It's willful disobedience. This is deeply ingrained in those societies. You can see it in this thread. "Spoiled brat syndrome." Your parents, your teachers, the professionals you are taken to because your grades are bad and they just can't figure it out because they've tried everything and she's just so smart. If she does the work, she forgets to turn it in. See? She's lazy. That must be the problem. But you desperately want to follow those norms. You would cut your own arm off to follow them if you could because you are made to feel as if you are the lowest of the low because you "won't". After years of this, you feel as if this is absolutely true. You must be the defective person, the "spoiled lazy brat" that they said you were for so many years, even though you tried so hard not to be. When science finally catches up one day and turns your life around those wounds never fully heal, and you still hear those messages. Of course, I can ignore them as an adult but I can't help but think of the children who will hear them and it breaks my heart every time. Even if words aren't actually said, they know.

[ck4829]

35. It absolutely is, I don't dispute that ADHD exists at all

There is though ADHD as it exists as a neurological 'object' and then there is ADHD as an 'object' that exists in our society and how we perceive it and define it. As a sociologist, I'm very interested in the second thing.

[kcr]

36. That's what I was trying to get at

Even though it's a neurological disorder, it manifests itself behaviorally, so the social aspects of it are an issue. As with all mental health issues, the attitude is often if there are no distressing effects socially or culturally, then there are no problems and no "disorder", so there's nothing to treat. So, there's no question that there is a social component.

[lamsmy]

29. Educational approach helps

My daughter's spent most of their primary education in the French school system. The first 3 years of school are called the Maternal section. While they do follow a generally traditional curriculum (basic reading and math) priority is placed on learning the social skills they will need to navigate their way throughout their school years successfully.

Young students are taught the value of respecting their classroom, classmates, and teachers. Slow learners who need extra help are not the ones unable to master the times table, they are the ones who find it difficult to work constructively alone or in groups. Sometimes this involves showing parents at home how they can help.

While there certainly is a biological dimension that leads to disruptive behaviour, by having a consistent and well-understood development programme in place in every school goes a long way to mitigating the damage. The rate of naturally occurring ADHD is probably similar across most nations. What is different is how each national system chooses to deal with it.

I do know this, in both the French schools my daughter's attended, there seemed to be remarkable civility among the students (older ones greeting the youngest with handshakes, eg). When we switched to an American international school because of a move, we were all shocked at the unruly and toddler-like behaviour of the students. I'm a critic of some aspects of the French system, but when it comes to producing happy, productive student environments, they've got the Americans beat hands down.

[Vinca]

34. So how is big pharma supposed to turn a buck on therapy??